Laban soseman



(No Model.)

L. SOSEMAN.

WIRE FENCE. No. 591,703. Patented Oct. 12,1897.

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UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

LABAN SOSEM'AN, OF OSKALQOSA, IOWA.

WIRE FENCE.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 591,703, dated October 12, 1897. Application filed January 15, 1896. Serial No. 575,574. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, LABAN SOSEMAN, a citizen of the United States, residing at Oskaloosa, in the county of Mahaska and State of Iowa, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Wire Fences, of which the following is a specification.

The object of my invention is to provide a wire fence which will be strong, light, and inexpensive, one which may be kept taut by a simple, novel, and effective tightener, and which will also be provided with means not only for protectingboth the top and the bottom wires from assault and consequent derangement, but which will be provided with a novel form and adaptation of stays to hold the intermediate wires from both vertical and lateral displacement, and which are themselves adapted to be applied to the barbed wire and securely retained in proper position upon the intermediate Wires by the barbed wire and upon the unbarbed wire by special fastenings.

The invention consists in certain combinations, constructions, and arrangements of parts hereinafter particularly described and claimed with reference to the accompanying drawings, which illustrate my invention, and wherein Figure 1 is a side elevation of a single panel of fence; Fig. 2, an enlarged elevation of the tension device with its operating-lever in its first position in full lines and in its second position in dotted lines; Fig. 3, an enlarged elevation of the tension device after it has been partly moved up by the lever to tighten the wire; Fig. 4:, an enlarged plan of the tension device; Fig. 5, afdiagram of the slideplate before it is folded; Fig. 6, an enlarged perspective of the upper end of a stay adapted to receive the intermediate wires and interlock with the barbed wires, and Figs. 7 and 8 special fastenings for holding the stays onto smooth wire.

The posts 1 support the strands of wire by suitable means which hold the wires at properly-regulated distances apart. V

Stay-bars 2, of hard wood and of any required dimensions, are bored, as at 3, upon their flat sides at suitable distances to receive each of the plain wire-stringers 4t and allow the same to be drawn freely through them. The bars 2 are also bored at their ends with holes, as at 5, to receive the twisted strands nicate, respectively, with the holes 5, and the slackened wires 6 and 7 are slightly twisted out of line to pass through the said diagonal slots 8 and enter the straight alinement-holes 5 in thevline of the fence-wire, and when the said barbed wires are again made straight and taut by suitable means the bars 2 will be securely held upon the said wires and will also be held between the two next adjacent barbs upon the wires, thus retaining the said bars in place upon the fence-panel at proper intervals of length.

The wire stringers 4 and the barbed-wire top and bottom strands 6 7 are likewise stretched by means of a tension device formed in the following-described manner:

An adjustable perforate bar 9 is made of thin bar-iron, to one end of which the adjacent end of the fence-wire is secured, the

other end of said bar being. passed through the slotted bent end of a perforate slide-plate 10 and adjustably secured thereto in the following-described manner: The slide-plate 10 is made of a rectangular iron plate, as clearly shown in Fig. 5, all cut out or punched out ready to be folded at 11. The corner holes 12 of the plate fold opposite each other to receive rivets 13, to which the hooked ends 14 of a wire loop 15 are secured. The holesv 16 are punched to overlap each other and provide a slot through which the bar 9 passes,

and holes 16, 17, and 18 are punched, respectively, at such distance from each other that two opposite holes will be arranged in said slide-plate 10 after it has been folded to receive and hold a bolt 19 upon both sides after said bolt has been passed through the slideplate and through the bar 9 when the latter is adjusted.

The holes 16, 17, and 18 in the plate are placed somewhat nearer to each other than the holes in the bar 9, and consequently the adjustment of the bar upon said plate may be effected by graduations corresponding to the difierence between the distances of the said holes from each other, and the adjustment is effected in the following-described manner: A lever 20 has a hook-plate 21 pivoted thereto at 22 a short distance above the end of said lever, at which is secured a studpin 23, which latter takes into one of the holes 24 25 26 of the bar 9, and the hook-plate 21 engages at its notched jaw 27 with the fold 11 of the slide-plate 10 when said hook-plate is distended, and pulling upon said lever the slide-plate and bar 9 are drawn together until one of the holes 16 17 18 comes opposite a corresponding hole 24:, 25, 26, &c., in the bar 9 to receive the bolt 19, thus providing suitable means for the adjustment of the bar 9 and with it the end of the wire secured thereto upon the slide-plate 10, to which is fixedly secured the loop 15,- and the end of a corresponding or adjacent wire is fixedly secured to this loop, thus allowing the ends of the fence-wire to be drawn together until the wire is sufficiently taut by a very simple form of lever and adjusting device, thus enabling great power to be applied to the fence-wire to tighten it by simple means.

The tiglitener may be placed at any place required in the fence-preferably at the middle point in a stretch-and may be applied to the barbed wire as well as to the intermediate wires. v

The wiresare'all stretched to their initial tension by hand or in the usual way and are then stretched to their full or complete tension by the device before described or a similar one, the stays 2 having first been strung upon the intermediate wires and the upper and lower barbed wires having been first twisted and sprung into their slots and bored holes in the upper and lower ends of said stays.

The tightener is applied to the loose ends of a string of wire, and by applying the handlever and drawing the slide-plate and adj usting-bar together by successive movements, as above described, the locking-bolt may be applied to the adjacent holes in .said plate and bar to suit any degree of-tension or adjustment required. The stays hold the wires all laterally against displacement and also give the fence a finished appearance and provide visual obstructions of well-known character. The stays are secured to smooth wires by a special novel form of fastener, (shown in Figs. 7 and 8,) which consists in atie-wire 28, twisted at one end 2S around the smooth wire and passed through the stay with said wire and back again and then looped at 28 and turned up at its end or passed through once and turned up or looped only.

I claim as my invention and desire to secure by Letters Patent- 1. A wire fence comprising fixed posts, unbarbed-wire mediate stringers and a barbedwire outer stringer supported thereon and a stay having transverse holes through the same in the line of the fence, to allow the unbarbedwire stringers to pass freely through the stay and having a like transverse hole and an oblique longitudinal aperture leading thereto from the end of the stay to said line-hole to receive the barbed wire, substantially as described. r

2. A wire fence comprising posts, unbarbed intermediate wire stringers, a barbed top wire stringer and a stay having apertures bored through the stay in the line of the fence ,to receive and hold the intermediate wires,

and having like holes bored at its ends to receive the barbed wire, and oblique slot-apertures leading from the end of the stay to said line-holes to receive the barbed wire, substantially as described.

3. A tension device for wire fences, consisting of a slide-plate having perforations therein adapted to be connected with one end of the fence-wire, an adjustable bar adapted to be connected to the other end of said fencewire, and having perforations and a lockingbolt adjustable in the perforations of said slide-plate and bar, substantially as described.

4. A tension device for Wire fences, consisting of a slide-plate having perforations therein at opposing sides, an adjustable bar fitted to slide in said plate and having perfo rations therein at graduated distances greater than the distances between the adj usting-perforations in the slide-plate, and a lockingbolt to engage said perforations, substantially as described.

5. A tension device for wire fences, comprising an adjustable perforate bar, a slideplate consisting of a rectangular piece of metal slotted intermediately, perforated to receive a locking-bolt andbent longitudinally one end upon the other and united at its corners to receive respectively the ends of a loopwire, and an adjustable perforate bar to pass through the slot in said plate and be interlocked with the perforations thereof by a bolt,

substantially as described.

6. In a fence-wire tightener, the combination of a metal slide-plate as 10 bent one end upon the other and provided with an end slot, rivets securing the ends of said plate together, a perforate adj Listing-bar fitted within said plate 10 through the end slot, a locking-bolt to connect the said bar and plate, and a loop-wire hooked atits ends around the rivets of the said slide-plate, substantially as described.

' 7. In a wire fence the combination with the posts and wire stringers of a folded slideplate and a perforated adjusting-plate secured to said stringers, and a lever consist- In testimony that I claim the foregoing as my invention I have signed my name in the :0

ing of a bar, a hook-plate pivotally connected presence of two subscribing witnesses. therewith, a stud projecting laterally from one side of said lever and adapted to engage respectively with the fold of the slide-plate and with the perforations of the adjustingplates, substantially as described.

Y LABAN SOSEMANQ Witnesses:

W. G. JONES, O. H. HARE. 

